'Homosexual Panic' in Colorado Springs

June 6, 1996

COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo.  Brice D. Miller has been ordered to face trial later this year on second-degree murder charges in connection with the 1994 bludgeoining death of Robert W. Walton, a 50-year-old church deacon in an evangelical ministry.

Both Miller and Walton had been suspects in a 1992 robbery of a book and gift store where they had both worked at the time, although neither men were ever charged in the case.

Police said that 1992 link led them to Miller, who eventually confessed that he hit Walton in the head repeatedly with a large rock in the remote park where Walton's body was discovered.

Authorities said Miller, 23, said he hit Walton because the older man had made sexual advances toward him in the park.

Walton had worked at the Missionary and Christian Alliance, based in Colorado Springs.

Despite the savage nature of the killing, only second-degree murder charges were filed against Miller, and he is free on $25,000 bond until the trial.

Miller is expected to base his defense on the panic and fear he said he felt at Walton's alleged advances.

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